"Letter from Sgt. Lee F Walenta" (Post #87)

AN INTRODUCTION FOR THE LETTERS 
WRITTEN DURING THIS BATTLE
Shared by Sgt. Lee F. Walenta
Second Infantry Division
15th Field Artillery Battalion
Battery B ~ Second Gun Section
Charles Knight's same Gun Section

This letter by Sgt. Walenta shares an example of what Captain Roland of the 99th Division shared with author Stephen Ambrose: "Our accomplishments in this action were largely the result of small, virtually independent and isolated units fighting desperately for survival. They present an almost-unprecedented example of courage, resourcefulness, and tenacity on the part of the enlisted men, non-commissioned officers, and junior-grade commissioned officers of the line companies." 

(p. 209, Citizen Soldiers, Ambrose)

Lee F Walenta                                                       1991

1108 Sycamore Road

Richmond, Texas 77469

Battle of the Bulge

Dec 16, 1944 – Jan 25, 1945

     The Battle of the Bulge was fought in the Ardennes, a wooded rugged region in Northern Belgium and Luxembourg and adjacent to the German border known as Schnee-Eiffel. The Second Infantry Division went into line here Oct 4, 1944, after cleaning out the Germans in Brest, France (this took 28 days) and held a thin line of 27 miles in this area. The 15th Field Artillery Battalion was a unit of the Second Infantry Division. This Division was a unit of the V Corps and the U.S. 1st Army.

     In November the snows came and the scenes on the front were liken to the scenes on pictures of Valley Forge. We wore combat boots (leather) and wore overshoes (rubber) to keep the combat boots dry.

     On Dec 10, 1944, we, the 2nd Infantry Division were relieved by the 106th Infantry Division, fresh from the States – No Combat Experience.

     We moved out to take a segment of the Seigfreid Line so as to secure the Roer River Dams so as to prevent the Germans from blowing those dams, which would have flooded the area. Our attack went well until the morning of Dec 16, 1944, when our attack had to ground to a halt. We then had to turn around and go from the offensive to the defensive. The Germans had moved 3 armies poised to attack through the Ardennes to capture the U.S. 1st Army supply dump in Liege, Belgium. All of the German troop movements were made unnoticed because aerial observation could not be conducted due to the cold fog that blanketed the region. We were confronted by the 6th Panzer Army commanded by Sepp Dietrich which constituted the main effort. The Germans overran the 106th Infantry Division and afflicted inflicted heavy losses to the 99th Infantry Division, thus exposing a flank of our 2nd Infantry Division.

     Major General Walter Robertson, the 2nd Infantry Division Commander, came to our CP (Command Post) and told us the situation was so critical that he ordered us to hold that ground at all costs, and as it turned out, we did just that and much more because we destroyed tanks and equipment and soldiers to a fare-thee-well.                             

                        

Two roads shaped as a letter Y

was part of the road network in our defensive sector-We had zeroed on the point where the two roads came to a single road. German tanks  came toward us (15th FAB) and when they got to the zeroed in point-we began firing, knocking out the lead tanks in each column, then we raised our fire and knocked out the tanks at the rear end of each column. We then proceeded to beat them on each column from front to rear. The tanks could not disperse off the roads due to the ruggedness of the terrain and the deep snow on the ground.

     We continued to ward off the enemy until reinforcements could arrive to stabilize the line. On Dec. 20, 1944, we pulled out of our somewhat exposed position and made the displacement in 4-5 hours under the cover of darkness and in the bitter cold.
     In our new position we set up ready for action, but had to wait maybe an hour before we began firing because a German tank column was pouring into a town in our front (Wirtzfeld). There were several doughboys in a cellar in that town with radio communications that informed our command when all tanks finally arrived. Then we had a fire mission that required us to expend the most rounds of ammunition at any time during the war-then in a matter of minutes we repeated the fire order-added though we fired as corps artillery-many, many guns of different calibers-and proceeded to destroy the tanks, the soldiers and the town, a complete wipe out. The above mentioned doughboys survived the shelling and returned to our lines as the situation permitted. They had a pet dog with them but had to choke him to death because if the dog had barked-this may have given away their position.
     At daybreak (Dec. 21, 1944), the 9th Infantry Division and the 1st Infantry Division arrived to help take care of things-and they were a very welcomed sight. That action and situation more or less to use the old saying ---- "Katie Bar the Door." (means take precautions; there's trouble ahead.)
On Dec 21st- the Sixth Panzer Army faced a formidable American line - the 9th Infantry Division - 2nd Infantry Division - 99th Infantry Division - 1st Infantry Division - plus one other veteran Division - this included three of the most experienced divisions in the U.S. Army (one being us).
     On the afternoon of Dec 21st, our artillery supported the 2nd Battalion of the 26th Infantry Regiment of the 1st Infantry Division on our immediate right and this artillery concert fired over ten thousands rounds in an awesome display of firepower. Not a single SS Panzergrenadier got past the line of fox holes.
     The weather broke before Xmas day and the U.S. Air Force - P-38's - P-47's - P-51's took over the skies and put on the skids on the German effort.
     All who took part of the Battle of the Bulge can proudly say that they took part in and won the "Mother of All Battles."
     Hoping this info may be useful - and also to hear from you soon.                                                                        Sincerely,
                                            Lee F. Walenta

U.S. Army combat artist Harrison S. Standley preserved the wartime look of the crossroads at Lausdell and the Palm farmhouse where a heroic stand was made against the advancing Germans on December 17-18, 1944

LAUSDELL – HOLD AT ALL COSTS!

Sgt. Lee Walenta's account in his letter
shared in the 15th FAB Yearbook

     How I obtained the above letter from 

Sgt. Lee F Walenta

Tec 5 Raymond L. Cilley, in Battalion Maintenance of the 15th Field Artillery Battalion died 26 Feb 1973. Some years later his daughter began searching for any men from the 2nd Infantry Division. She wrote to those she had been able to find an address. She desired to know if anyone knew her father during the war. Most who responded did not know her father. Sgt. Lee Fred Walenta wrote her back a 4 page letter sharing his memories of the Battle of the Bulge.

     My uncle, Charles D Knight, served in the same Second Gun Section as Sgt. Lee Fred Walenta. The daughter, therefore, sent me a copy of his letter to read and use in my blog. It was quite a surprise and honor to receive a letter written by one of my uncle’s close comrades of WW II. Therefore, the story shared by Sgt. Lee Walenta is the exact events my Uncle Charlie went through in the first days of the Battle of the Bulge.

Name: Sgt. Lee Fred Walenta

Birth Date: 15 Jun 1915

Place: Fairchilds, Fort Bend County, Texas, USA

Enlistment Date: US Army 5 Oct 1939 

Release Date: 6 Aug 1945 

 Served in the 2nd Infantry Division, 

15th Field Artillery Battalion, 

Battery B, Second Gun Section

Death Date: 13 Dec 1999

Place: Houston, Harris County, Texas, USA

Cemetery: Davis-Greenlawn Cemetery

Rosenberg, Fort Bend County, Texas, USA

• Sgt. Lee F. Walenta's German Nemesis

Josef "Sepp" Dietrich

Josef "Sepp" Dietrich (28 May 1892 – 21 April 1966) was an Osbert-Gruppenführer in the Waffen-SS, the armed paramilitary branch of the Schutzstaffel (SS), who commanded units up to army level during World War II. Prior to 1929, he was Adolf Hitler's chauffeur and bodyguard but received rapid promotion after his participation in the extrajudicial executions of political opponents during the 1934 purge known as the Night of the Long Knives. He later commanded 6th Panzer Army during the Battle of the Bulge. (A Panzer division was one of the armored (tank) divisions in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II.) Despite having no formal staff officer education, Dietrich was, along with Paul Hausser, the highest ranking officer in the Waffen-SS. After the war he was imprisoned by the United States for war crimes and later by West Germany for his involvement in the 1934 purge.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepp_Dietrich

Battle of the Bulge: Heroic Stand at Lausdell

by Bill Warnock

https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/battle-of-the-bulge-heroic-stand-at-lausdell/

After Wahlerscheid fell, the 1st Battalion established its command post in one of the captured bunkers. As the final hours of December 16 ticked away, Hancock walked outside the bunker and surveyed the surroundings. He looked far to the south and saw a blue cloud bank stretching for miles and miles. Hancock surmised that an attack must be in progress.

He ambled back inside the bunker. About then, a field telephone rang. The regimental executive officer was on the line. The executive officer said the enemy had launched an attack to the south and had penetrated the American line at several points and said the 9th Infantry might have to abandon Wahlerscheid and move south in the morning to help stop the German assault.

Hours later, on the morning of December 17, the battalion commander, Lt. Col. William Dawes McKinley received an urgent summons to the regimental command post. The entire 9th Infantry had orders to pull out. It seemed like a bad dream. The men began referring to Wahlerscheid as Heartbreak Crossroads.

Nobody in the 9th Infantry knew the full extent of the German attack to the south. On December 17, 1944, McKinley and his men began the chore of moving south to meet the German attack. First, the battalion had to disengage from Wahlerscheid without the enemy becoming aware that an American pullout was under way. The rear guard darted up and down the line, firing from numerous positions to give the appearance of normal operations. Mortar men from Company D and howitzer crews from the 15th Field Artillery Battalion added to the ruse by laying down barrages on the enemy. McKinley’s men were the last soldiers of the 9th Infantry to leave Wahlerscheid.

A little farther south the men came upon Maj. Gen. Walter M. Robertson, commander of the 2nd Infantry Division. He flagged down McKinley. The general apprised his subordinate of all available information regarding the German attack. Robertson then directed McKinley to move his battalion and secure a crossroads northeast of Rocherath and defend it against enemy forces.

McKinley received instructions to take command of 3rd Battalion included Company K, a section of machine guns from Company M, and the Ammunition & Pioneer Platoon from Headquarters Company already at the crossroads and attach them to his battalion. The crossroads itself lay amid a patchwork of cow pastures, which local residents called Lausdell.

McKinley told Bill Hancock and Captain Glenn M. Harvey, battalion operations officer, to plan the defense of Lausdell. Two of the battalion’s three rifle companies were placed in front of Company K. Company A led by commander 1st Lt. Stephen P. Truppner dug in on the right of the main road that cut through Lausdell. Company B led by 1st Lt. John S. Milesnick dug in on the left.

Company C was in a reserve position on the battalion left flank led by its new commander, Captain Arnold E. Alger, well behind the other two rifle companies. Besides positioning the rifle companies, Harvey and Hancock gave deployment instructions to Captain Louis C. Ernst, commander of Company D. Ernst paired his two machine-gun platoons with Companies A and B. He placed his mortar platoon along a hedgerow directly behind the Palm farmhouse, and he established his command post near the mortars.

In the opening hours of Hitler's desperate gamble on the Western Front, American troops fought desperately at Lausdell to slow down the German juggernaut because it was their mission to defend the crossroads at all costs.

While McKinley spoke to his company commanders, his artillery liaison officer, 1st Lt. John C. Granville, sat just inside the entrance of the command post and agonized over a stroke of bad luck. “I was trying to make contact with the 15th Field Artillery Battalion,” Granville recalled. “But my radio wouldn’t work.” Minutes later, Granville’s fortune changed. “Lieutenant John W. Cooley, a forward observer with Battery A of the 15th Field Artillery, arrived at the CP to ask for instructions regarding artillery support. I told Cooley that my radio was out and that we had to use his radio to make contact with the 15th and, since he would be without any means of communication, he was to stand by as my backup. Lieutenant Cooley and his crew then prepared to dig in about 20 yards behind the battalion CP.” Granville soon reached the Fire Direction Center of the 15th Field Artillery and transmitted all coordinates.

Visibility dwindled to almost nil as night and fog enveloped the Lausdell defenders. The men strained to hear any sign of the enemy. Nothing stirred. The stillness lasted until 7:30 pm on Dec 17 when, from the east, the men heard the hum of engines and the distinctive squeak and clatter of tank tracks. Four armored vehicles approached. The company commanders had already informed the troops that friendly tanks might be in the area.

As the vehicles drew nearer, the GIs thought the machines were friendly. False assumption. They were Jagdpanzers from the 1st Company of SS Panzerjäger Abteilung 12, and each had an escort of foot soldiers from the 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment. The grenadiers and tanks passed through without a shot fired. They disappeared into the night and continued on toward Rocherath.

Soon thereafter, the Americans heard a second group of tanks approaching. Nobody doubted they were German. As the machines rumbled closer and closer, Busi lay mines on the road, as did two other members of his company, Sergeant Charley L. Roberts and Pfc. Harlin E. Coffinger.

The lead tank was Panther 135 struck one of the mines. Firing erupted. The five-man crew of 135 cut loose with its 75mm cannon and two machine guns. The spray of bullets killed Tech. Sgt. Charlie A. Reimer and Staff Sgt. Billy Floyd, both members of Company A. Panther 127 clanked up to the crossroads. It bypassed the crippled 135 and began turning left toward Rocherath.

Just then, Private William A. Soderman of Company K rose from behind a hedgerow shouldering a bazooka and faced the enemy tank at close range. He squeezed the trigger of his weapon, and a rocket streaked through the air. The wrenching explosion shattered a track link, and the tank rolled to a halt.

The crew inside 127 began firing high explosive shells. The turret rotated a few degrees, and the main gun barked out a shell. Another shot followed after that.

Busi started launching rifle grenades at 127, hoping to stifle its big cannon. One of them detonated along the base of the turret. The blast sent out a long tongue of fire. “The turret stopped rotating and didn’t move again,” Busi recalled. Crewmen quickly emerged from the maimed beast, and GIs everywhere opened up on them. Shots rang off the steel hull as the crewmen perished one after another.

Machine gunners from Company D participated in the killing. The squad, led by Corporal Sydney L. Plumley of West Virginia, squirted a steady stream of bullets at the tank. His squad also engaged German infantrymen, who had begun appearing out of the gloom.

The crew of 135 remained inside their vehicle and carried on the fight. Their cannon shells ignited hay inside the Palm barn and turned the structure into a flaming pyre. The inferno increased visibility at Lausdell, and the Germans took advantage of it. One shot cut down Plumley and his assistant, Pfc. Harry Hooper. Another shot hit a machine gun killing Pfc. Howard Ammons and Pfc. Frank J. Cudo.

The situation demanded quick action. “We knew something had to be done as we would all be killed,” recalled Harlin Coffinger. Sergeant Roberts and another Texan, Staff Sgt. Odis Bone of Company B, retrieved a five-gallon can of gasoline from an American vehicle abandoned nearby. Bone and Roberts crept up behind 135, accompanied by Busi and heaved it onto the engine deck. Gasoline gurgled out. The tank commander inside became aware of the danger and opened the turret hatch slowly just enough for the commander to toss out a grenade. Bone and Roberts dropped to the ground just as it exploded. The blast injured Roberts in the hand. Ignoring his wound, he leaped to his feet and flipped the phosphorous grenade onto the engine deck. The gasoline erupted into flames, and the fire beat red against the black sky.

Lieutenant Roy Allen and Technical Sgt. Ted A. Bickerstaff of Company B pulled a “daisy chain” of eight antitank mines across the road in front of the tanks. Bullets flicked up dirt around the two men as they armed the mines.

Alert to the danger, the tank drivers veered into adjacent cow pastures. The huge battle wagons slewed mud and hunks of sod as they side slipped the daisy chain. American soldiers clutching bazookas stalked after them. The commander of Company B was among the hunters.

German infantrymen had accompanied the tanks, and some of the soldiers crept among the American foxholes. One SS man jumped in the hole occupied by Pfc. Roberto Gonzales of Company D. The startled GI fled and reported the situation to his platoon leader, 1st Lt. Allyn H. Tedmon.

“Did you kill him?” Tedmon said.

“No.”

“Go back and kill him.”

Gonzales carried out the order, using a trench knife to dispatch the enemy soldier.

Tedmon led the 2nd Heavy Machine Gun Platoon and his little band of defenders pelted the German infantry with machine-gun bullets. Three riflemen from Company A did the same. Pfcs. Harry Stemple, William L. Adams, and Rodney M. Jennings climbed aboard Panther 127 and took over one of its machine guns. The men soon had it spitting bullets at the enemy.

Lieutenant Granville worked orchestrating artillery support. Granville transmitted his initial call for assistance at 8:36 pm. He began searching the road with shellfire, starting close to Companies A and B and shifting the barrage back toward the forest.

Shells plunged down with a piercing wail as salvo after salvo hit the enemy. The German tanks and infantry halted. The Lausdell defenders heard wounded enemy soldiers calling for medical attention. “Sani! Hilfe!” they cried.

The commander of Company A soon reported more tanks approaching. Granville shifted the artillery bombardment and stymied the new threat. At 10:30 pm, the Company A commander again reported tanks—Panthers and Jagdpanzers. This armored assault converged on Lausdell from three directions. It was the heaviest attack of the night.

Granville described his response: “As the action thickened, I threw all orthodoxy to the wind and, in very unmilitary jargon, called for fire ‘on the right’ or ‘on the left.’ Now those sorts of commands would have made no sense had I not been able to give the precise coordinates of our command post as well as the coordinates of the first target. But, having established those two points, I knew that a line had been drawn showing the relationship of our position to the network of roads.”

The staff at the fire direction center translated Granville’s calls into precise coordinates and then assigned targets to the 12 howitzers of the 15th Field Artillery. Target assignments also went out to six other artillery battalions, which General Robertson had thrown into the fight. Granville (call sign “Two Four One”) pleaded for everything his FDC could scrape together.

Then, to the rear of Lausdell, the horizon lit up like dawn. Granville heard the distant rumble of howitzers followed by the whoosh of shells hurtling overhead. The wave of projectiles exploded in a horrible cyclone of steel and fire. Shock waves from the bursting shells quaked the earth as the detonations merged into a single deafening din. Everywhere the enemy attackers turned, they saw the bright face of Death.

“During the height of the artillery barrage, a German tank commander broke into our radio channel. He was giving excited commands to his forces, and he and Granville were talking at the same time over the same radio channel. This was too much for Granville to stomach. He screamed into the radio, ‘Get off my channel, you kraut son-of-a-bitch!’”

By midnight, the wild melee had subsided, and the sour stench of TNT hung in the air. Panthers 127 and 135 stood at the center of the battlefield like a pair of tombstones. The Germans had withdrawn to regroup and marshal more forces.

Hitler’s great attack struck along an 89-mile front and overwhelmed numerous American units. The 2nd Division had faced envelopment, but the successful defense of Lausdell on December 17 gave the division time to maneuver.

The 38th Infantry, sister regiment of the 9th Infantry, deployed around Krinkelt-Rocherath and moved in behind McKinley’s troops. Linemen spliced together a telephone wire from McKinley’s command post to the 38th Infantry. The colonel obtained information about the defensive line forming behind his battalion. The men at Lausdell would eventually withdraw through that line but not before receiving permission. For now, they had to continue holding Lausdell.

Throughout the predawn hours of Dec 18, 1944, Lieutenant Granville called for harassing fire on the Panzer-infested woods to the east. Artillery shells interdicted roads, trails, and anywhere the enemy might be massing forces. German armor and infantry girded for renewed combat.

The renewed German assault broke on Lausdell before sunrise. With McKinley at his side, Lieutenant Granville shouted for all the artillery fire his FDC could muster in front of Companies A and B. Granville recalled what happened next: “McKinley handed me his radio receiver. From the other end came an admonition to me: ‘You’re killing my men. You’re blowing them out of their holes.’ I immediately ordered fires in that sector moved back one hundred yards or so. To this day, I could not tell you which officer I was talking to. I was sick at heart.”

Although the shelling inflicted friendly casualties, it blunted the German attack. The tanks and grenadiers turned tail and fell back. In the morning light, the Germans pushed forward again. Like a giant battering ram, an extended column of tanks plowed toward Lausdell.

Artillery shells began raining down on the phalanx of men and machines, but it wormed its way to within 20 feet of the American foxholes. William Soderman darted along a ditch to engage the oncoming tanks. He leaped onto the road and pointed his bazooka at the lead vehicle. His rocket disabled it.

Meanwhile, the German foot troops had fanned out. Grenade battles erupted, as did hand-to-hand combat and bayonet fights. Soderman killed at least three enemy soldiers with another shot from his bazooka. He used his last rocket to disable another tank. As he scrambled for cover, machine-gun bullets from the tank tore open his right shoulder. He dragged himself a short distance before two buddies helped him off the battlefield.

Panthers prowled around Lausdell, blasting foxhole after foxhole. One shell exploded near the position occupied by Rodney Jennings and Harry Stemple. The blast peppered Stemple with fragments, and he bled to death in Jennings’s arms.

Lieutenant Truppner, the Company A commander, made one last radio transmission. He requested artillery fire on his own position. His troops ducked into their holes as howitzer shells burst pell-mell throughout the area. The explosions rocked the landscape with concussion and left men bleeding from their ears.

At 10 am, McKinley received permission to withdraw around noontime. By then, troops of the 38th Infantry would have a new line behind Lausdell. McKinley had one stabbing worry. How could he accomplish a retrograde movement with his men locked in close combat? The enemy would blast his soldiers in their backsides if they attempted to disengage. Artillery as a means of cover was problematic. It might hold down the Germans but would butcher the withdrawing defenders as they rose from their holes. What to do? The officer in charge of the battalion antitank platoon spotted an answer churning in the morning mist.

First Lieutenant Eugene V. Hinski sprinted toward four American tanks roving along the Rocherath-Wahlerscheid road. He shouted at the man in charge, 1st Lt. Gaetano R. Barcellona from San Antonio, Texas. “Do you want to fight?” Hinski said.

“Hell, yes! That’s what I’m here for.”

Excited hands pointed the eager tank commander to the battalion command post, where McKinley rejoiced at the sight of the four lumbering friendlies.

McKinley, his operations officer, and Barcellona leader of the 2nd Platoon of Company A, 741st Tank Battalion hatched a plan to use the armored platoon for a counterattack. The maneuver would permit the remaining Lausdell defenders to retreat. The planners decided to split the tank platoon in half, two vehicles north of the withdrawal route and two vehicles south of it. After a 30-minute artillery barrage, the northern pair moved out at 11:45 am. They served as decoys, attracting the eyes of the Panther crews.

The distraction allowed Barcellona’s other two machines to move out and creep close enough to make use of their armor-piercing shells. The tank gunners scored two hits on one enemy vehicle and three on another (the victims may have been Panthers 127 and 135, already out of action).

With the Panther menace momentarily dispersed, McKinley’s men, those not already overrun, pulled their noses from the muck and began falling back. The commander of Company B, Lieutenant Milesnick, rousted his men and guided them away despite his being hobbled by a leg wound.

Many of the retreating Americans escaped under covering fire provided by a lone Company D machine gunner, Technical Sgt. James L. Bayliss.

As he hammered out .30-caliber slugs, German armor again converged on Lausdell. The crew of a Panther spotted him and unleashed a shell. The projectile flew wide. Bayliss ignored it and stayed behind his weapon. The Panther cut loose again but missed. The sergeant never flinched. And then—wham—it all ended. He died in a blinding flash as a tank shell found its mark.

Joe Busi and two of his men fell back to the battalion command post. One of McKinley’s lieutenants directed Busi to a jeep loaded with ammunition and a machine gun. The sergeant fetched a couple boxes of ammunition. One of his men hoisted out the gun, and the other grabbed a tripod for it. The threesome had instructions to set up the gun at the far end of a long hedgerow and provide suppressing fire. The soldier carrying the gun led the way. Private Joseph Popielarcheck had the tripod. Busi cautioned him, “Stay down below that hedge. Don’t let ’em see you.”

The Germans also saw him and began yelling. Busi realized the danger and screamed, “Get the hell down!” Adrenaline pumping, he tore after Popielarcheck and dove to knock him flat. But an enemy shell won the race. The blast cut Popielarcheck in half and knocked Busi unconscious.

After regaining his senses, Busi crawled away to the battalion command post, where a medic dressed his wounds and pointed him toward the rear. Busi limped away. He chanced upon a large hole containing four or five wounded soldiers, men who had suffered everything but death. He joined them and said, “Guys, we might as well pray. The Germans are coming like crazy with big tanks. They’re gonna kill us all.” Everybody started to pray.

The nerve-grinding rumble of tanks soon followed. Prepared for the worst, Busi poked his head above the lip of the hole. The tanks belonged to Lieutenant Barcellona’s platoon. They were attacking in an attempt to spring free the remaining Lausdell defenders. Medics arrived shortly thereafter and evacuated the injured men.

Many others also never returned to the 9th. They became prisoners of war, and their ranks included Captain Garvey of Company K. From inside the Palm farmhouse, he watched German infantrymen capture his soldiers and most of Company A.

McKinley, Captain Harvey, and Captain Ernst were the last men to escape Lausdell. As they hightailed it out, German soldiers shouted at them: “Hände hoch! Hände hoch!”

The casualty roll also included 146 soldiers who found themselves on the rueful road to prisoner of war camps in Germany. Days after the men became prisoners, New York Times correspondent Harold N. Denny began interviewing those soldiers who had avoided captivity. His writing invested the Lausdell defenders with heroic stature for their role in what newspapers called the Battle of the Bulge. Denny authored a front-page article with the headline: “U.S. Battalion’s Stand Saves Regiment, Division and Army.” Those words represented more than journalistic hyperbole. The men under McKinley’s command, and their comrades in the artillery, had staved off the 12th SS Panzer Division for 18 hours. Without that delay, the enemy would have been in position to inflict a devastating defeat upon the 2nd Division and the U.S. First Army.

During those crucial hours, McKinley’s soldiers upheld the motto of the 9th Infantry Regiment: “Keep up the fire.”